downdata wrote:

If this goes on for a few more months which looks like it will then half the airlines in the world are going to shutdown.

Really? This will pass and the world will get back to where it was before COVID-19 and then the world will need to travel but only half of the available seats will be there. Governments will not allow that to happen.

etops1 wrote:

Why is UA still operating EWR-MXP?

From a business perspective, if they're still seeing strong enough demand and there's no government restriction on it, financially it makes sense to continue to operate it. AZ and EK are also still operating JFK-MXP. UA and DL are also still operating to ICN.

TW870 wrote:

Any anecdotal info on what passenger loads look like on US domestic flights? I see lots of posts upthread showing excessively light loads on US-Asia and US-Europe. But what about within the US? I have a couple of trips coming up in the next couple of weeks, and I am wondering if I am going to be on empty airplanes. Right now seat maps showing full, but I know that is not an accurate indication.

I was on a flight 5 consecutive days (Mon-Fri) this week ... first time in my life I've flown 5 straight days. All my flights were late afternoon or evening.

Anyway, my anecdotes:

Monday: DEN-CLT, UA E175. 1 seat empty, seemed fairly typical.

Tuesday: CLT-LAX, AA A321. 95%, seemed fairly typical.

Wednesday: LAX-DEN, WN 737. Now this was only 30% (!!!!!) full. There wasn't even a B loading group (I'm referring to WN's A, B and C groups). But it may have simply been a function of time: a mid-week 9:20 PM PT flight that got into DEN a bit after Midnight. That sort of flight isn't necessarily going to be the most popular, especially among business travelers, if there are other options (and there are a ton of LAX-DEN options).

Thursday: DEN-ORD, UA 757. 100% full - not a single seat unoccupied.

Friday: ORD-DEN, UA 777. A widebody, a plane with a whole lot of seats. Still ~90% full.

All-in-all, it seemed fairly normal. LAX was a zoo, but what else is new? ORD, CLT and DEN had what seemed to be a typical amount of people in the concourses.

Can concur just got back from Mexico yesterday flights completely full only got upgraded coming back. Airports overcrowded.

It is forward bookings for mid-March and beyond that are making airline execs nervous. There isn’t a panic, which would mean current operations would be low load factors. However, businesses and families have just decided to hold off on future plans until they see where this goes. Forward booking curves for April and May are off the chart disasters.

MXP is inside the new Red Zone.

Likely to close today.

NYCVIE wrote:

etops1 wrote:

Why is UA still operating EWR-MXP?

From a business perspective, if they're still seeing strong enough demand and there's no government restriction on it, financially it makes sense to continue to operate it. AZ and EK are also still operating JFK-MXP. UA and DL are also still operating to ICN.

Not anymore. Anyone living in Lombardy and 14 other central and northern provinces of Italy will need permission to enter or leave. Milan and Venice are both affected. It will last until 3 April.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-51787238

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/08/italy-a ... ation.html

bennett123 wrote:

MXP is inside the new Red Zone. Likely to close today.

All Wizz flights to/from Malpensa, Bergamo and Treviso are cancelled with immediate effect.
All flights between Italy and Georgia suspended as well by order of the Georgian government.

The big problem is that airline seats are 'perishable', that if not used by a certain date, then that revenue is lost and may not be made up later.
I suspect that this virus will trigger a significant international recession into 2021 which will mean a reduction in demand for flights.

As of today (March 8th) most major European airlines have suspended service to TLV due to Israeli government orders not to allow citizens of some countries to enter. All flights of Alitalia, Lufthansa, Swiss, Austrian & Iberia suspended till end of March, so as some routes by Ryanair & Wizzair. Videos of social media showing El Al flying mostly air now days.

Boeing as ex. DOUGLAS may have to pick up design documents out of the shelf and begin to reproduce DC-3, a slant floor aircraft. Passenger demand would shrink so small that the DC-3 can handle it enough. 737 MAX might be too oversized.
As long as I look at the Japan-Korea track, it is as if the clock had been winded back to wartime 1950.

Just looked at FCO website.

They have now picked up the change in Italy, (perhaps they watch www.airliners.net!!).

However, the area where they advise against all but essential travel, is still limited to the ten towns.

Crazy.

The Italian PM signed the decree about the quarantine of Lombardy yet aircraft are continuously landing and departing in MXP/LIN/BGY. Easyjet, Ryanair, Alitalia, TAP, Air Europe, Laudamotion, the lot of them. Rather hard to understand what kind of quarantine is it then.

holczakker wrote:

The Italian PM signed the decree about the quarantine of Lombardy yet aircraft are continuously landing and departing in MXP/LIN/BGY. Easyjet, Ryanair, Alitalia, TAP, Air Europe, Laudamotion, the lot of them. Rather hard to understand what kind of quarantine is it then.

Air and railtravel are excluded from the lock-down

Also urgent Business and Personal Travel on the street but you have to declear the reason of your travel at the checkpoints

So it's just a pretend lockdown / quarantine... anyone want to predict when somebody in Govt changes their mind and MXP, LIN and BGY are closed ?

asdf wrote:

holczakker wrote:

The Italian PM signed the decree about the quarantine of Lombardy yet aircraft are continuously landing and departing in MXP/LIN/BGY. Easyjet, Ryanair, Alitalia, TAP, Air Europe, Laudamotion, the lot of them. Rather hard to understand what kind of quarantine is it then.

Air and railtravel are excluded from the lock-down

Also urgent Business and Personal Travel on the street but you have to declear the reason of your travel at the checkpoints

So wait, they put an area in quarantine but it's ok to have crowded trains coming out of there full of infected people, as well as flights taking the virus to points all over the world?

Could this virus push our most vulnerable airline (American) into bankruptcy?

American Airlines Group (AAL) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on November 29, 2011 after suffering losses for about 4 years.

peterinlisbon wrote:

[...]So wait, they put an area in quarantine but it's ok to have crowded trains coming out of there full of infected people, as well as flights taking the virus to points all over the world?

Exactly. Just go to the website of the Swiss Federal Railway and check the connections between Milano Centrale and Lugano (or any other ploint in Switzerland).

https://www.sbb.ch/en/buying/pages/fahr ... plan.xhtml

Have flights between the USA and China/South Korea/Japan and Italy stopped yet?.

If the Italian government is forbidding all public gatherings in the area, I'd expect the airports to close.

Yeah the airports should close, or else it’s all really kind of pointless?

Seems like Vietnam Airlines suspended all of its European operation (between SGN, HAN and CDG, FRA and LHR) after 10 pax on VN54 (LHR-HAN, March 2nd, B787-9) were infected to the virus.
Unclear if Bamboo Airways will delay or cancel its PRG introduction at the end of this month.

What I'm seeing from the airlines seems to be theater right now. Superficial changes to give the appearance of protecting the customer. Still no policy on removing yourself from your shifts if you have corona. They expect employees to eat penalty points for calling out and/or using up their vacation. Result? employees will do what they mostly do now, come to work to avoid penalties until they physically cannot, all the while infecting others. So dumb.

Did I mention that some airlines still have these customer facing employees cleaning the planes themselves between flights instead of dedicated cleaning teams using proper protection and procedures?

CobaltScar wrote:

What I'm seeing from the airlines seems to be theater right now. Superficial changes to give the appearance of protecting the customer. Still no policy on removing yourself from your shifts if you have corona. They expect employees to eat penalty points for calling out and/or using up their vacation. Result? employees will do what they mostly do now, come to work to avoid penalties until they physically cannot, all the while infecting others. So dumb.

Did I mention that some airlines still have these customer facing employees cleaning the planes themselves between flights instead of dedicated cleaning teams using proper protection and procedures?

This is absolutely right. Labor policy is what will make the epidemic much worse in the U.S. than other industrialized countries. Since 1970, the vast majority of the new jobs created - and especially those in the service sector - have no sick pay, and penalize employees for calling in sick. Plus, in the U.S., health insurance is tied to your job. This all creates a huge incentive for individuals to hide their illness and work sick, as it is the only way to protect your income and your access to a doctor.

Hopefully they will come up with prophylaxis to slow this down, as treatment will be particularly crucial in the U.S.

o0OOO0oChris wrote:

I think the coronavirus will have a long lasting impact on aviation. Companies just got aware that planning for something like this has to be part of a sustainable business plan. And it may be even change the way business operates and giving home office concepts and teleconferences the edge.

Or how Elon Musk put it:
https://twitter.com/BoredElonMusk/status/1235962895717957632

That conclusion you’ve come to about the fundamental ways our work and businesses will be changed post-Covid19 is not novel. Everyone has known for quite some time that remote work is completely doable for non-manufacturing jobs, and that most conferences are just boondoggles.

This crisis will change a lot.

And I would not be surprised is the business travel demand will not recover to the levels before the crisis.

To be honest, this is not correct. I work for one of the largest European financial firms and seriously reduced corporate travel a few years ago (also due to reduce costs). As such we're very used to video conferencing and business Skype meetings. However, despite the techinical abilities, nothing beats a face-to-face meeting. As such our corporate travel has increased dramatically over the past few years. I agree, not to the level what it used it to be, but still we realised that face-to-face contact beats videoconferencing and other forms of contact in many situations. As such our current travel policy (though not applicable at this moment due to the virus) is to be very critical on whether one needs corporate travel, but also not avoid it when it adds value. I reckon many other big firms have gone through the same process and thus corporate travel will rebound.

Aside from Lufthansa grounding its 14 A380s and China Southern grounding its 5, have other airlines sent any into storage or grounded a portion of their fleet?

https://thepointsguy.com/news/lufthansa ... ronavirus/

"According to an internal memo, the airline is only seeing a load factor of about 35% on its largest aircraft"

"The superjumbos will be parked at least through the end of May"

Do you think this virus will make the 744s retire early? No airline that big of a plane.

AZ cancels MXP flights from tomorrow:
https://www.repubblica.it/economia/2020 ... refresh_ce

Starlux (JX) went from having 6 flights a day at its peak to having just one now. Airline has cancelled all hiring, including new hires that had already been offered a position.

TPE-MFM suspended
TPE-PEN suspended
TPE-DAD reduces to 1 daily
TPE-CEB launch rescheduled to July

eta unknown wrote:

AZ cancels MXP flights from tomorrow:
https://www.repubblica.it/economia/2020 ... refresh_ce

How about EasyJet - will they be suspending flights too?

I suppose AZ and U2 are the two biggest airlines at MXP.

NZ321 wrote:

Halophila wrote:

I am due to fly tomorrow to Australia through California (from New England). I'm visiting a family member who is a senior and has cancer (and going through chemo). Current advice is to avoid being within 2 ft of anyone showing symptoms. Should I cancel? (lots of personal complications here).
And what are airlines doing if anyone develops a fever and cough mid-flight but might not meet the case definition of travel and contact? On almost all my US-Australia flights in the last 2 years (n = 18) there's been someone coughing nearby...

With all due respect for your situation, this is not the right forum for your question. Most of us are not medically qualified to respond. You should seek the adivce of a doctor. But the bottom line as far as I can see, is that frequent fliers continue to fly and airpoirts and terminal lounges are blissfully quiet. As far as I know from the information distibuted modern airplanes are not a space you are likely to pick up the virus if you practice good hygiene and don't happen to sit next to, in front of or behind somebody who has it.

Yesterday I did a quick brainstorming of the risk area's with a former colleague of mine who works in maintenance for a LH Group airline.

These are the risk area's that we came up with:

-Cabin ventilation. In aircraft cabins, air from the airconditioning packs enters the cabin from vents located close to the ceiling, and is removed from vents located at floor level in the sidepanels.
As such, anyone sitting in the same row and within at least 2 rows in front and behind an infected person is at risk.
The air is circulated at a high rate, but it's still going to pose a risk as you are sharing the same space over a longer duration of several hours.
On a widebody aircraft, this becomes more complex as you can imagine.
If you want to visualise what I mean, here is a link :
https://youtu.be/r1zaX2MWl3g

-Cabin crew: cabin crew are walking along the aisle so breath in air from the entire cabin. They collect dirty trays and cups and also socialise with passengers and other crews in the galley. They are most likely to get infected and to pass on an infection.

-Cabin cleaning. Someone posted a video of how seriously Qatar Airways is taking cabin cleaning. However, if you look well, they are using a cabin cleaner that is not a disinfectant but a detergent. So instead of disinfecting the cabin, they might actually be spreading germs all over the place. Not cleaning is better than cleaning the wrong way.

-Catering. An infected individual may be preparing your cold entrees or salads.

-Lavatories. If an infected individual uses a lavatory, people coming after him may get infected.

-Airports. Airports are often not well ventilated large spaces. There you will come in contact with check-in, gate agents, security agents, who will come in close contact with hundreds of people everyday.
Security screening points are used by thousands of people everyday, some where people have to go through barefooted. Trays are reused hundreds of times each day to put personal belongings full of germs, nobody is disinfecting them.
Machines where you slide in your passport or boarding pass.

-Lines and lines. Lines at check-in, lines at security, lines at emigration, lines at the boarding gate, lines in thr boarding bridge, lines when trying to deplane, lines at immigration, lines at customs.
You spend a lot of time with a whole lot of people.


So plenty of opportunities for infection there.

I haven't read but the last two pages of this thread so my apologies if this has been covered . . .

I work for a large US auto manufacturer and on Friday all air travel is suspended indefinitely and personally this is going to be a quite a change since I am flying to different places every week. I hear/read other companies are doing the same. I am sure some of this is just an overabundance of caution. Does anyone have an idea of how long all these travel restrictions need to last? Is it until the number of reported cases stops growing exponentially? I can easily see this corona virus issue being with us for the rest of 2020.

This has the potential of having an even bigger impact on travel that the great recession 2009-2011 - at least in the short term.

When will travel get back to normal?

I know of companies such as Amazon, J.P Morgan, and others who are ending all business travel (both domestic and international) without direct approval from certain departments to limit exposure to COVID.

Considering the size of these companies and the Im sure many will follow

FlyingJhawk wrote:

I haven't read but the last two pages of this thread so my apologies if this has been covered . . .

I work for a large US auto manufacturer and on Friday all air travel is suspended indefinitely and personally this is going to be a quite a change since I am flying to different places every week. I hear/read other companies are doing the same. I am sure some of this is just an overabundance of caution. Does anyone have an idea of how long all these travel restrictions need to last? Is it until the number of reported cases stops growing exponentially? I can easily see this corona virus issue being with us for the rest of 2020.

This has the potential of having an even bigger impact on travel that the great recession 2009-2011 - at least in the short term.

When will travel get back to normal?

This is mainly companies not wanting sick employees at work or healthy employees that get quarantined after travelling to an infection hotspot. So these restrictions are likely to last until governments stop freaking out over every (suspected) case.

Waterbomber2 wrote:

-Cabin ventilation. In aircraft cabins, air from the airconditioning packs enters the cabin from vents located close to the ceiling, and is removed from vents located at floor level in the sidepanels.
As such, anyone sitting in the same row and within at least 2 rows in front and behind an infected person is at risk.
The air is circulated at a high rate, but it's still going to pose a risk as you are sharing the same space over a longer duration of several hours.
On a widebody aircraft, this becomes more complex as you can imagine.

There are 10 grades of aircon filter, rated one (protect the equipment from FOD) to 10 (operating theatres and other sterile environments).

Recirculating cabin air in an aircraft reduces hourly flying costs. Almost 100% of cabin air on a 787 is recirculated to eliminate the heating overhead. The airline sets re-circulation upper and lower limits, and the flight crew can make adjusts only within those.

Unlike an operating theatre, where a blocked filter triggers an alarm, on an aircraft the filter is bypassed (like the oil filter in your car).

Aircraft are fitted with a range of filter types. If high number types only were used, they would block quickly. Usually filters are in a cartridge, containing say a Type 1, 3 and 5, and then another containing a 6 and 7 or 8. In the present circumstances, should they contain 9's and 10's.

OEM interest is in demonstrating the lowest possible operating costs to potential customers, not the cleanest air to passengers, so the OEM filter replacement cycle is meaningless for passengers and crew.

The cleanliness of cabin air depends on the number and grades of filters used, the frequency of replacement (and whether replaced with new, or cleaned and re-used old ones), the percentage of outside air admitted compared to recirculated, cabin volume, number of passengers and crew, and the rate of circulation.

Like restaurant health compliance grades, airline cabins should be graded, or required to make this information available when booking, as should cruise ship operators. And whether they clean and re-use single use filters, and how they dispose of used filters.

A relative owned a business making very specialised HEPA filters for a range of industries.

oschkosch wrote:

The BBC has an interesting opinion. And I agree, there will be many more airline collapses in the coming weeks and months.
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-51748139

The failure of Europe's biggest regional airline Flybe could be the start of more casualties, analysts predict. On Thursday, a global airline industry body warned the financial hit from coronavirus could reach $113bn (£87bn) this year.

The bleak prediction came on the same day UK-based Flybe went into administration. Airline experts are forecasting more failures as passengers cancel flights. Flybe's collapse "will likely be the first of many in 2020," said James Goodall, transport analyst at Redburn.

It's really sad because so many people are impacted, but the airline business is brutal, so this is a likely outcome.

o0OOO0oChris wrote:

I think the coronavirus will have a long lasting impact on aviation. Companies just got aware that planning for something like this has to be part of a sustainable business plan. And it may be even change the way business operates and giving home office concepts and teleconferences the edge.

Or how Elon Musk put it:
https://twitter.com/BoredElonMusk/status/1235962895717957632

That conclusion you’ve come to about the fundamental ways our work and businesses will be changed post-Covid19 is not novel. Everyone has known for quite some time that remote work is completely doable for non-manufacturing jobs, and that most conferences are just boondoggles.

You realize you're quoting a parody Elon Musk account, no?

Some of my employers have been pro remote work, some have been very anti.

Some managers just want to see butts in seats, it makes them feel powerful.

Some managers feel being at work will minimize worker's distractions, some feel working from home does that.

Bottom line for me is teleconferencing has not had the impact I was thinking it would.

Maybe CV will change this, but I kind of doubt it.

How long will it take for air travel to rebound after the virus slows?

Nicknuzzii wrote:

How long will it take for air travel to rebound after the virus slows?

We're a long way from knowing how this is going to play out: numbers infected, number of countries impacted, reliable fatality rates...

BravoOne wrote:

tphuang wrote:

scbriml wrote:

Who is being told not to travel domestically and by whom?

You have probably already heard about Amazon telling its employees not to travel domestically. I think you will find this is happening across many companies in North America. Where if you have not booked, you are told not to book any trips until things settle down. If you have booked and must go, then you are likely to have to self quarantine for 2 weeks when you get back from your trip.

All the companies are tell their employees to be safe and conservative. Cancel every large events and any non-essential travel.

That is such a gross exaggeration.

I work for a Fortune 500 that requires a ton of corporate travel and we’ve suspended all travel indefinitely. All conferences have been canceled and employees who have traveled to certain regions are required to telework for 14 days upon coming back to the states

Romania suspended flights to/from Italy, all airports, between March 9th (starting at noon) and March 23rd. Moreover, all airlines operating in Romania are not allowed to transport passengers to Romania from Italy, China, South Korea, Iran via connecting flights

https://www.hotnews.ro/stiri-esential-2 ... stache.htm

MIflyer12 wrote:

Nicknuzzii wrote:

How long will it take for air travel to rebound after the virus slows?

We're a long way from knowing how this is going to play out: numbers infected, number of countries impacted, reliable fatality rates...

Seems like it is slowing in certain areas. China actually had control of the virus pretty much now.

Nicknuzzii wrote:

How long will it take for air travel to rebound after the virus slows?

There could be some magic spell cast today that got rid of it and it'd still take a long time to recover. Fear is a powerful thing

LNCS0930 wrote:

smokeybandit wrote:

Nicknuzzii wrote:

How long will it take for air travel to rebound after the virus slows?

There could be some magic spell cast today that got rid of it and it'd still take a long time to recover. Fear is a powerful thing

it’s not like 911 when people are afraid of someone doing something on a plane. People will get over this fast once the cases stop or dramatically slow

Thank you!!

LNCS0930 wrote:

smokeybandit wrote:

Nicknuzzii wrote:

How long will it take for air travel to rebound after the virus slows?

There could be some magic spell cast today that got rid of it and it'd still take a long time to recover. Fear is a powerful thing

it’s not like 911 when people are afraid of someone doing something on a plane. People will get over this fast once the cases stop or dramatically slow

...but if the global economy has been harmed enough and we will be in the next global downturn for, let us say, 4 or 5 years, than the airlines will be again for prolonged time harmed. As the global economy was already weak with the trade war and Brexit as example, the Coronavirus just came to the wrong time and the on-going hysteric, we can see now, is even more worse. With the over capacities and many already weak airlines, not earning money....

KlimaBXsst wrote:

Another prediction:

Compass and GoJet “may” weather this better than other regionals just because their declining staffing levels with the Trans State announcement should provide adequate staffing levels during the course of the year, if there is ANY incentive to put everyone on a single seniority list and cross train, as they try to strengthen their appeal, and ability to keep regional contracts for the Big 3, or at least be marketable for an acquisition.

I don't actually see how they can since their contracts are bid as un-economically viable for them to even do business. So? What are they going to do? Suddenly ask for a better contract while the majors are redistributing their airplanes? They Bid on the model they thought would be ok. And they're dying on that same model. Maybe their people can go elsewhere and really earn a living.

Cathay has cut all service to Japan and reduced Taipei to 4 weekly https://www.routesonline.com/news/38/airlineroute/290158/cathay-pacific-to-maintain-taipei-service-in-march-japan-changes-as-of-0100gmt-08mar20/

EDIT: Seems to be caused by new rules for entering Japan from HK: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-08/cathay-pacific-to-temporarily-suspend-japan-flights-from-monday

DL just suspended ATL-FCO until Apr 1 and delayed the start of DTW-FCO. Would have loved to be a fly on the wall at those high-level discussions.


https://news.delta.com/delta-suspends-a ... -continues

**Apr 30